Injuries taking toll on Stanley
JOHN Coleman said even the top teams in the world would stuggle to cope with the amount of injuries Accrington Stanley are currently contending with.
The Reds were beaten 2-1 at Walsall on Tuesday evening, three days after losing 1-0 to Crawley Town at the Wham Stadium.
With the likes of Toby Savin, Jay Rich-Baghuelou, Brad Hills, Baba Fernandes, Liam Coyle, Shaun Whalley, Joe Pritchard, Shaun McConville, Rosaire Longelo, Seamus Conneely and Alex Henderson were all unavailable due to injury or suspension, leaving Coleman down to the bare bones as he prepares for this weekend’s trip to promotion-chasing Wrexham.
“As it stands now we’ve got 18 fit players and we’ll try and prepare as best we can for Saturday,” said Coleman. “I’ve said before, injuries are an occupation hazard, but it’s an unusual amount, there’s no denying that.
“When you lose a lot of your top earners, that reflects what you’re probably going to get.
“If you take the top seven or eight earners out of any team, from Real Madrid, Liverpool, Man City going down to Leeds, going down to Leicester, going to Sheffield Wednesday, going to Sunderland, take any of their seven, eight, nine top earners, it’s going to be it’s going to be a a a massive setback to them.”
Coleman acknowledged Walsall were the better team at the Bescot Stadium in midweek, the defeat leaving the Reds in 15th place in League Two, though still within five points of the play-off places.
The Stanley chief was once again left frustrated by the performance of referee Farai Hallam and his team of officials.
“I just can’t understand what I’m seeing on a regular basis,” he said. “I don’t know what constitutes a foul any more because most of the time we get fouls given against us. I can’t remember the last time when the foul count was in our favor. Some of the fouls that they gave Jamille Matt were embarrassing. It’s so hard to take and unfortunately for us we have to take it nearly every week.
“I’m disappointed, obviously, but we can’t really complain about getting beat – they were the better team on the night.
“The disappointing thing is we’ve conceded from two corners, two identical corners. If they didn’t score them they might have scored another goal, but they were both fouls on the keeper.
“The first one’s a foul on the keeper and we tell the fourth official – the fourth official relays it to the referee that our keeper’s getting fouled from corners and then he gets fouled again, so there’s not a lot you can do there, really. It’s clever play by them, if they’re getting away with a block on the keeper to stop him going backwards.
“The first one he’s grabbed hold of him and the second one he’s got two arms out blocking
him – the keeper has possibly got to be a bit stronger.
“On the balance of the game they made more chances than us, we were hanging on at times. They missed a couple of sitters and you think it’s going to be on night.
“But I think that’s about the fifth time we’ve been leading with 25 minutes to go away from home and
not won and lost probably three or four of them, which is disappointing but I can’t really complain about the result.
“What annoyed me from the first minute to the last is the awarding of fouls. What wasn’t a foul for us was a foul for them, and that’s not making excuses because I think Walsall deserved to win because they were the better team. But we deserve to have a level playing field.
“There was just no balance at all, absolutely zero balance. It got painful to be honest, it got painful to watch – it was like a slow drip and it wouldn’t be the first time that’s happened to us away from home this season.
“That’s the overriding frustration.”